Space Deputy

by Jenny Schwartz

  She jinked the Lonesome, but not on purpose. Her hands simply jerked as she relaxed. Her friend had survived.

  The cruiser, the other spaceship contributed by Elliot Keele, vanished twenty seconds later, by the same method. The crime lord’s mercenaries were gone.

  “Bandit fleet locked down,” Lon said.

  “Harry, you okay?” Max asked.

  “Yup. I’ll stay out and keep an eye on things. Recharge the lance.”

  Thelma inhaled and exhaled noisily, as if she had asthma. Harry was alive. They all were. They’d survived, and Harry had killed dozens of people. The Lonesome and its crew hadn’t picked this fight. The ones who’d come after them—after her?—had been the aggressors. Nonetheless…

  Max stretched out an arm. “Come here.”

  “I’ve got the helm,” Lon said. “We’re solid. I’m analyzing the play. Nefertiti observed the entire encounter,” he added in tones of grim satisfaction.

  Thelma’s hands ceased shaking from an overload of adrenaline and clenched into fists. “And neither she nor her crew bothered to help?”

  “We chose not to run,” Max reminded her. The fact that he was willing to abandon the gunnery station to come to her meant that the battle really was done.

  She resisted his attempt to enfold her in a hug, thumping a fist against his chest instead. It wasn’t a hard strike. It was fear and helplessness that she could express now that they were safe. Sharing it earlier would have been counterproductive self-indulgence, and against all of her independent mining family’s and Galactic Justice academy training. “We were one against ten!”

  “And we chose to make a stand,” he repeated.

  “Our decision, our consequences,” Harry agreed over the comms.

  Lon added. “Although I suspect Nefertiti’s crew is aware of Max’s identity. If Hardwick had captured the two of you, Covert Ops would have rescued you.”

  Max pulled Thelma into a hug while she frowned in confusion. He explained. “Whether we live or die is on us, but if Hardwick managed to kidnap me, and worked out who I was, I’d become a bargaining chip to attempt to influence Dad.” President Smith.

  The brutal logic of that reasoning was trademark Covert Ops. Her and Max’s lives didn’t matter, other than as chips on a political game board. Rather than scream her frustration and fury, Thelma kissed Max. It was a much healthier—and more enjoyable—method of working out their post-battle tension.

  “Ahem.” Lon interrupted before they could get any clothes off. “The marooned Pilgrim trampship is still out there. I would lay odds that their plight is genuine.”

  Max pulled away reluctantly. “I’ll hail them. Lon?”

  “Contacting them now.” The transmission-ready button at the captain’s desk turned green.

  Max spoke in the direction of the screen, trusting the bridge’s audio equipment to catch his voice. “Trampship Scarab, this is Sheriff Max Smith. Please respond.”

  For a miracle, they did.

  Thelma leaned against the bulkhead in relief. They weren’t going to be dealing with a ghost ship.

  “Sheriff Smith, this is Captain Tengku. Our propulsion unit has carked it. The secondary engine burned out, unable to handle the load. Our air and water recycling system has failed. We are rationing water and isolating sections of the ship. We have about two days’ of breathable air, or so my chief engineer calculates. It’s possible he’s being optimistic, as he was about the secondary engine’s capacity and the recycling system’s filtration system being self-cleaning. And the range of our communications system.” From the captain’s tone, her chief engineer was likely in the brig. If a trampship had a brig. “Sheriff Smith, our long range sensors detected missiles. Bandits contacted us thirteen hours ago.”

  “The bandits have been neutralized,” Max said.

  “All of them?” Shock thinned Captain Tengku’s voice to a squeak.

  “Yes. How capable is your engineer? I can send over engineers from the bandit fleet if you’re capable of guarding them?”

  A new voice broke in, baritone and Rock Sector accented. “We can watch the blighters.”

  “Patriarch Tobiah, please don’t interrupt,” Captain Tengku said plaintively. She obviously didn’t expect to be obeyed, and wasn’t.

  Patriarch Tobiah continued gruffly. “Name’s Earle Tennant. This patriarch malarkey is asteroid dirt balls. When I get my hands on that rascal Canute…calling himself Elder Jakob and leaving us to die out here. I’ll wring his scrawny neck. Lying squeal weasel.” He harrumphed and abandoned threats for pragmatism. “We need spare parts and hands that know what they’re doing. The chief engineer on this floating death trap is a druggie. I reckon as he’s been selling off the vessel piece by piece.”

  “Patriarch Tobiah, please!”

  “Well, it’s true, Sue-ann.”

  Thelma and Max looked at each other with raised eyebrows.

  “Sounds like you’ve had an interesting time,” he said. “We can discuss Elder Jakob at a later time, although I’d appreciate it if no one contacted him until after we talk.”

  “No problem, mate. I’m not talking to that scoundrel till I’m there in person and can hit him. Or shoot him.”

  Max didn’t question Earle’s attitude. As he’d said, that could wait. “I’ll contact a couple of the bandits’ ships. The engineers that agree to assist the Scarab will shuttle in with spare parts. My mech will escort them. Meantime, we’ll lock with the Scarab and vent atmosphere through the lock tunnel as an interim measure.”

  “Much appreciated.”

  Max ignored the patriarch’s gratitude and the relief in his tone. He and all of the people he was responsible for had been facing death, a nightmare passing that Jakob Canute could have remedied. “Captain Tengku, send me the Scarab’s Customs manifest.” It would list the trampship’s passengers and cargo.

  She did so within a couple of minutes.

  “Twenty three children,” Thelma murmured reading the manifest while Max coordinated things with Harry. Her skin flushed with rage. It seemed that after having been alerted to their situation, Jakob Canute had left over two hundred people, including children, to die out here.

  That the bandits and mercenaries had been able to get into position to ambush the Lonesome raised the nasty suspicion that Canute had collaborated with them to see Max and her dead. Had Canute used the Pilgrims on the Scarab as bait for her and Max? “I’m going with you aboard the Scarab,” she said hurriedly to him.

  “Combat suit.”

  She nodded. Earle and Captain Tengku sounded honest, but their story needed to be verified before trust could be given.

  Lon made his own preparations, not only readying the atmos pumps, but also assembling a pallet of provisions, namely water and fresh fruits and vegetables. He also piloted the Lonesome into locking distance with the Scarab.

  Thelma trusted him to be looking out for any treachery. If someone aboard the trampship blew it up while the Lonesome was so close, they’d be damaged if not destroyed. She struggled with her combat suit, far slower in donning it than Max who had years of Star Marine experience in wearing one.

  While she fought with the bulky suit, he squeezed in brusque negotiations with the bandits that resulted in two of twelve volunteers being chosen to be transported over in their own shuttle with Harry guarding them.

  Harry hadn’t accompanied the Lonesome to the Scarab, but waited among the bandit fleet. Before he boarded the shuttle, he’d have to shed whatever additional constructs enabled him to be both a stealthy, swift spacecraft and a devastating plasma weapon. But even in his ordinary mech mode the bandits wouldn’t cause him trouble—or if they did, they’d regret it.

  Thelma pushed away the thought of the three spaceships and their crews that were simply gone: the destroyer, the cruiser and the tiny gunboat. The first two kills were justified. Lon hadn’t been able to hack the destroyer and cruiser’s systems, negating the possibility of a non-violent solution. For the Lonesome’s sur
vival, the destroyer and cruiser had to be eliminated from the battle. The gunboat had fallen to Hardwick’s ruthlessness.

  So many lives gone. Even if they’d been evil people, the cliché remained true: each of them had been someone’s child.

  It was also confronting to face the reality of Harry’s combat ability. By his own admission, he remained in the Saloon Sector to guard the Eldorado Cache. Those raphus geodes wouldn’t be going anywhere with him on duty—and pity any surveyors who found them and tried to make off with them.

  Thelma focused on the pallet of provisions and Max’s arrival in the Lonesome’s entrance chamber. They were ready to cross into the Scarab.

  They rapped gloved knuckles, then he opened the hatch and entered the tunnel.

  She held her blaster ready as she followed him.

  The pallet, on a hover-board, trailed her. Lon had added a tripod-mounted blaster with cameras to the center of the pallet. In effect, he guarded their rear.

  Fortunately, their caution was unnecessary. The Pilgrims and crew aboard the trampship welcomed them with open relief and tears. Even though they were suited up, people tried to hug them. Other people, more disciplined or desperate, approached the pallet. Soon everyone was eating and drinking.

  Captain Tengku plus Patriarch Tobiah and three of his people withdrew with Max and Thelma to the captain’s cabin. It made for crowded quarters, but provided privacy. Patriarch Tobiah closed the door.

  The Scarab’s story was briefly told. The Pilgrims aboard were all from the Rock Sector. Theirs had been a long, not entirely happy journey that had culminated in Elder Jakob’s refusal to rescue them.

  “…in spitting distance to Levanter, and every went to Hell…Heck,” he corrected himself with a sideways glance at his wife, the prim, gaunt woman sitting beside him eating an apple in tidy bites. “Jacob Canute told us to broadcast a mayday call. He wouldn’t help, but he mentioned you by name, Sheriff Smith. Said if you were in the area, you’d respond.” Earle’s gray eyebrows bunched in an almighty frown. “Made me mad. Made me suspect…we didn’t have any choice, Sheriff.”

  Mrs. Tennant put a hand on his arm. “The man knows that, Earle. We did what we had to for our people, broadcasting the mayday, and he did his job and took out the bandits.” Apple finished, she looked directly at Max. “The man who called himself the bandit chief said he’d back for us—for the supplies and women.” Her gaze shifted to Thelma on the last word.

  “You’re safe, now,” Thelma said impulsively.

  Mrs. Tennant ducked her head. She and the other women had lived with an additional fear, not just death for those they loved, but sexual slavery for themselves.

  “The Navy is on its way,” Max said. He was less open than Thelma with his emotions, but his terse words were also meant as a comfort. “They’ll take the bandits into custody. They’ll also investigate the Levanter colony’s failure to respond to your distress call.” In the weeks since the Lonesome’s visit to Levanter’s orbit, the Pilgrims had had sufficient time to make at least one of their spaceships spaceworthy. “They’ll want statements from you.”

  “We’ll be happy to provide them,” Earle growled.

  The other two men, his son and nephew, nodded agreement.

  “The Navy will then escort you, along with the vessels in the captured bandit fleet, to the nearest habitable world, which is Levanter,” Max continued.

  Earle began to grin. It wasn’t a nice grin. Should a patriarch smile like that? There was a wolf’s anticipation of the hunt in his face.

  His son and nephew gave off the same predatory vibe.

  “You’re not like the other Pilgrims…” Thelma said softly.

  “We believe in God and the End Times,” the son said. “Whether those things happen in my lifetime or my grandchildren’s old age, Levanter gives us land and a place to defend. Out on the edge of the Federation, we can breathe.”

  “We will survive,” Earle said. It had the resonance of a vow.

  Back onboard the Lonesome, Thelma barely had the energy to strip off her combat suit. In fact, Max helped her with the boots. Her thoughts remained with the people, the Pilgrims, that they’d left aboard the Scarab. The two engineers chosen from among the bandits were already at work, guarded by grim survivalists.

  “Elder Jakob won’t be able to control this group,” she said.

  “Their arrival will change Levanter.” Max sounded coldly pleased. Satisfied.

  It wasn’t till they were eating their belated dinner, “fresh” from the food dispenser for once since Thelma had other things than food on her mind, that she continued the conversation, picking it up as if showering, food and puttering around hadn’t interrupted it. “This is what you do, isn’t it? I hadn’t really understood. You keep the peace, but it’s also about putting things in place, arranging matters, so that others can act.”

  Max considered her across the table.

  She wasn’t sure what he searched for, either in her or in himself. She wasn’t judging him. She was neither critical nor admiring. She was too tired for either emotion. But in this state of emotional and physical exhaustion post-battle, and after seeing the Spartan conditions the Pilgrims had endured for months aboard the Scarab, the bare truth had a way of emerging. And being accepted.

  “I can’t change everything,” Max said finally. “Lon has a talent for identifying pivotal moments and actors. He could be a powerbroker. He could make either you or me into one. Instead, he and I—and Harry—have an agreement. We don’t directly involve ourselves in events.” His mouth twisted. “Sometimes we manage that better than other times. People have to be free to make their own choices. That principle is understood on the frontier. It’s why I feel comfortable here and why I fight to protect it.”

  Lon took over the explanation from him. “The extent of our meddling is that we give other people an opportunity to act.”

  Harry walked in. “You can’t force idiots and criminals to become angels, but you can keep in mind a goal and a belief that people can improve themselves and their environments.” His glance flickered to Thelma and away. As much as the AI had control of his mech body and its mobile face, it seemed he couldn’t—or didn’t try to—hide his uncertainty regarding Thelma’s ability to accept his lethalness.

  She got up, walked around the table, and hugged him.

  Harry’s hard mech body couldn’t soften, but he hugged her back with tender care.

  “Glad you’re home safe,” she said.

  “Welcome home,” Max added quietly, and smiled.

  Chapter 20

  Lon and Harry had been busy. The informal AI network was amazingly effective, and motivated by a sense of justice. Perhaps, like Lon, they didn’t overtly direct organic sentients’ actions, but they would follow up threats against their own kind and against those people AIs cared about.

  While the Lonesome stuck close to the bandit fleet, ensuring that Lon maintained control of the enemy spaceships’ systems, the engineers aboard the Scarab restored its life support systems, then recruited additional help from among their colleagues to overhaul the trampship’s main engine. The bandits ferried across to the Scarab were only too happy to escape their frozen spaceships and what they reported as the despair engulfing their crews. The bandits knew that when the Navy arrived, they’d be facing trial and years of imprisonment.

  Earle and his people rejected numerous offers from the borrowed engineering team who promised them a great life if they’d only fly the Scarab off to the Badstars, with the bandit engineers aboard, of course.

  As Earle said when he discussed the Pilgrims’ situation with Max and Thelma, there was no chance of anyone on the Scarab taking the bandits up on their offer. Everyone aboard the trampship remembered the bandit chief’s original threat to kill, rape and pillage them after he’d obliterated the Lonesome.

  The Scarab Pilgrims were, instead, making plans for what they’d do when they reached Levanter. Elder Jakob would not approve.

  Max d
id.

  So did Lon, who supplied them with additional seeds and agricultural technology suited to arid zone farming.

  Thelma was wrapped up in her own affairs. With her deputy duties complete, she had an information brokerage business to focus on. Information was only as valuable as the market she found for it, which meant she needed to build her client base. As she had with Darlene, Thelma provided her services free for the first contact. It was about playing the long term game. And sometimes it was about quietly informing a surveyor or a miner or a political lobbyist that she’d identified the game they were playing, the big score that they were about to make, and that she wouldn’t mess it up. It was a fine line to fly with that strategy. She didn’t want anyone to mistake her display of knowledge for a threat. It wasn’t. It was a promise, and a request that they remember her as someone capable of keeping a secret—and discovering them.

  Meantime, Harry took over from Lon the quest to discover who had sent Thelma the original message to stay away from Levanter. If she and Max had listened to that advice, the Pilgrims aboard the Scarab would have died or been sold into slavery by the bandits, but the Lonesome would have avoided a space battle.

  “Rudy Gua,” Harry said.

  Thelma stared at the AI mech in shock. They were in the training ring with her working on her endurance. She slowed her run on the treadmill. “Are you sure?”

  “Your classmate, Rudolf Gua, son of Senator Gua—may an elephant fart on her—sent the message just prior to the transit of the Galactic Justice vessel carrying the Senate Worlds Development Committee through the wormhole to the Boldire Sector and negotiations with the Bunyaphi.”

  Thelma jumped off the treadmill. “Rudy tried to save me?”

  Max joined the conversation. He’d entered without her noticing. “His no-details message suggests he was conflicted about whether to save you or allow you, and all of us, to be sacrificed to his mother’s revenge.”

  “To be fair,” Lon murmured. “Rudy isn’t aware of Harry’s and my existence, so he didn’t know we’d be killed along with Thelma.”